TO G. V. PLEKHANOV

Published:First published in 1928 in the miscellanyGruppa “Osvobozhdeniye Truda” No. 6.

      Sent from Loguivy (Northern France) to Geneva.

      Printed from the original.Source:Lenin
	  Collected Works,

      Progress Publishers,1971,

      Moscow,Volume 36,

      pages115-116.Translated:Andrew RothsteinTranscription\Markup:R. CymbalaPublic Domain:Lenin Internet Archive.You may freely copy, distribute,
	display and perform this work, as well as make derivative and
	commercial works. Please credit “Marxists Internet
	Archive” as your source.•README

July 2, 1902

Excusemy writing in such a hurry. I have come here to
Brittany for a rest (I am awaiting my family here as
well),[1]but in Paris Berg gave me his item, and I have received the
article over the signature of Veteran which you sent.

Iam completely in agreement with Veteran. On account
of the note about Lekkert inIskraI had a little battle with
Berg and Velika Dmitrievna, who both, as usual, had an
attack of nerves, and began to talk about the inevitability
of terror, and the need for us to express this (in one way
or another). The item inIskrawas thus a compromise:
that was all I managed tosecure.[2]

NowBerg himself has become more resolutely opposed to
terror, even that of the Lekkerts.

Butthe question is whether it is all right to insert your
article with the Veteran signature.Of course, if you wish,
it will certainly go in(and there is time for it to go into
the next issue)—but wouldn’t it be better for you to turn
it into a leading article for No. 22, combining it, so to
speak, with Berg’s article “How to Fight”? I enclose this
article which, in my opinion, contains passages requiring
corrections, passages which are undesirably evasive on the
question of Lekkert.

Ialso enclose an item about the priest’s letter. What
is your opinion?

Andso please reply as soon as possible, dear G. V., and
send all three articles straight back to London (J. Richter,
30. Holford Sq. 30. Pentonville: London W. C.). Write to
me at the same address.

Ithinka leaderwould be the best place to say what you
do say: the substance of the matter will be brought out
(the“objection” to Iskrawill be smoothed out) and the
integral impression will be made stronger. You will find
it easy and natural to develop your article into a leader,
therebysubstitutingit for the article “How to Fight”.
Such a substitution would, in my opinion, be the best result.

Allgood wishes,Yours,Lenin

[1]Fromthe end of June to mid–July 1902, Lenin lived in Loguivy
(on the northern coast of France) together with his mother, M. A.
Ulyanova, and his sister, A. I. Yelizarova.

[2]Areference to an unsigned editorial note to a letter from Vilna
(about the mass corporal punishment of demonstrators arrested
on May Day). It was published inIskraNo. 21, June 1, 1902,
in the “From Our Social Life” section, and dealt with the attempt
on the life of the Vilna Governor von Wal by the worker G. D.
Lekkert (Lekukha). Lenin andIskrahad repeatedly exposed the
harmful effect of individual acts of terrorism on the mass
workers’ movement, and in the event censured Martov and Zasulich
who approved of Lekkert’s act.

Furtheron, there is a reference to G. V. Plekhanov’s article
on Lekkert’s act, which was to be published inIskra’s next issue.Plekhanov accepted Lenin’s proposal and wrote an editorial forIskraNo. 22, entitled “The Russian Working Class and the Police
Whipping”.